Burn
by Muggle Jane
Summary: Severus Snape loathed parties, so why was he there? One-shot!


**A/N: Blah blah, don't own canon characters or situations, blah blah. Post-DH, AU, Snuna!**

He still wasn't sure how she'd talked him into it. Likely in much the same way she'd somehow managed to get him not to drive her away when she visited him, day after day, at his private laboratory. She was the only one who'd succeeded in getting him to tolerate her presence, though others had certainly tried.

One corner of his mouth curled up into a sneer. The first day she'd come to see him, she'd breezed in like she belonged there, depositing a fresh bundle of lavender on his bench as though he'd asked for it, and settling down on one of the hard wooden stool with a cup of tea in her hands, another set on the bench, seemingly appearing out of nowhere.

She'd chattered on about this and that, he hadn't really paid attention to the words, focusing more on what she wasn't saying. The way she held her body that spoke of physical hurt. The way she would only meet his eyes for a moment before her grey gaze slid on to something else that spoke of mental torment. Outside, she was much the same. Inside, however, Luna Lovegood had changed.

None of her worthless friends seemed to realize it, but the flashes of desperation he saw in her eyes as she interacted with them weren't born of imagination.

He quelled the urge to fidget, to resettle his thick robes around him. It was hot for the beginning of May, the kind of heat that predicted a very long summer to come. He didn't go anywhere without his high-collared robes, though. The scars on his neck drew whispers and pity. The whispers he could ignore. The pity was unbearable.

She never pitied him. She'd seen glimpses of them, and the look in her eyes had been curious, then understanding, but never pity.

He sat further into his shadowed corner. He'd seated himself away from everyone else in an effort to avoid being drawn into their inane foolishness, and questioned again why he'd bothered to come.

Laughter drew everyone's attention to the far end of the room, and he used the opportunity to stand and slip out into the hall, moving as noiselessly as a ghost. Some days he felt like a ghost, for everything that had become of his life.

Potter's house- Black's house before that- was considerably brighter than the last time he'd been there. It had been scrubbed within an inch of its life, no doubt thanks to the efforts of Molly Weasley and her brood of boisterous chicks. They'd seemed to grow louder as they grew larger, and there was only so much of them that he could take.

His feet carried him upstairs, caution seeking the areas of the treads that wouldn't creak under his steps. Why didn't he just leave?

He found himself in the jewel of the Black's house, the sitting room with the elaborate family tapestry spread across the wall. The familiar faces of those he'd known and worked with on both sides seemed to stare at him, but their soulless gazes held no pity.

He wasn't altogether surprised when a delicate hand slipped into his, a light pressure on his palm and fingers. "It is very loud downstairs," came the slightly apologetic observation. "I know you're not too keen on all the noise, but sometimes it's necessary to be around others. It's too easy to get lost in yourself."

He didn't much care for being touched, hadn't in longer than this girl, this witch, had been alive. But the touch of her smooth fingers against his was pleasant, and he didn't take his hand away. "Why did you bring me here?" he asked, voice thin but still as acerbic as ever.

She didn't mind his tone, she never did. "Because you were getting lost in yourself, Severus. It's not so very far from being lost in yourself to being imprisoned in yourself."

She'd never asked his permission to use his given name, and he'd certainly never granted it. But she used it all the same, and he never corrected her. He didn't know what else she would call him. She hadn't been his student in years, and he'd never liked being addressed by his surname. For his part, he avoided the use of her name altogether. She had to have noticed- despite the air of dottiness she gave off, she didn't miss very much. But she hadn't commented on it.

"I loathe parties."

"I know." There was a smile in her voice, and a glance down at her showed an expression on her face that one could term as _blissful._

His face fell into a familiar scowl at her blatant disregard for his personal comfort. "I must leave."

"No you mustn't." Her denial was made in the same pleasantly happy voice, and he tried to be angry, and failed rather spectacularly. "As much as you hate it, you like coming here and seeing that everything you went through wasn't a waste. That Molly still fusses and clucks as much as ever, that Harry's still stubbornly optimistic, that Hermione's still very ready to share her considerable knowledge with everyone."

His lips curled into a sneer again, but he couldn't deny what she'd just said. "I've seen." Why did she have to be so perceptive?

He felt her other hand, the one that wasn't holding his, come up and rest on his upper arm, just above his elbow. Her head rested against his shoulder. "It's not time to go yet."

"Why not?" The question came out dry, a touch sardonic.

"You haven't jumped over the fire yet."

An ancient tradition, a rather idiotic one, in his opinion. Some of the Weasley brood had lit a fire in the back garden, contained and obscured to the casual Muggle observer by magical means, and some of the foolish youth had taken to jumping over them to assure happiness and fertility.

"I fear I would burn."

"Burn with me," she said, moving around until she was facing him, still holding his hand, her wide grey eyes looking up earnestly into his face. He saw everything there was to see in her eyes, all of her hidden pain, all of her anxiety and regret. He saw, too, her hope. Hope and warmth and tenderness. There was something in the luminious grey depths that beckoned to him, an indefinable magnet that pulled at something in his very soul. She was exposing herself to him, baring more than she could have even if she'd undone the fastenings of her soft purple dress and let it fall to the floor about her feet.

He wanted her. He wanted to take her in his arms, to push her against the wall and let the entire Black family watch them engage in a dance older than time itself.

She saw it, her lips turned up in a shy, bewitching smile. Her other hand, the one that had left its imprint against his upper arm now came to rest on his chest. "Jump over the fire with me, and then you can take me home and we'll burn together."

He didn't answer her, but he found himself walking with her back downstairs, her hand comfortably held in his.


End file.
